We’re fixing up the house we just bought. It was built in 1932 and a screened-in porch was later turned into a room, so most of the walls are plaster over wood lath, and the rest are either drywall, or plaster over metal lath.
There are cracks, nail holes, and a hole big enough to show the metal lath and metal conduit behind it.
When do you use spackle, and when do you use plaster?
By the way, I think that ReadyPatch spackle is MUCH easier to apply and smooth out than vinyl-based spackle.
Janet
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Replies
The patching I am doing on drywall right now I use confill. What is nice about it is that it has fiberglass reinforcing in it. I leave it a little low of the finished surface and the top coat with drywall mud. Bigger holes I use mesh tape and drywall mud.
For that situation I use hot-mud, powdered setting joint compound, with mesh tape. You can follow up with topping if needed, it sands a lot easier.
I use hot mud (i.e. USG Durabond) and fiberglass window screen for reinforcement.
Make sure you wet the plaster edges with a plant sprayer before applying the mud, or the plaster will such the moisture out of the mud too quickly.
Why not use joint compound for nail holes, too? (I'm assuming that mud is the same as joint compound.)Janet
Edited 8/23/2009 12:44 pm by jyang949
You can, but it shrinks as it dries, which is one reason why its a three coat process. So sometimes it'll leave a tiny dimple when it dries. Spackle is better for nail holes. Joint compound better for patching.View Image bakersfieldremodel.com
The traditional way is to use perlighted gypsum plaster, aka gypsolite or structolite, for the base, or brown coat, then plaster over that. Always wet the edges and backer of the repair, or better yet, use PlasterBond.
I've used Durabond and EasySand for the topcoat. I prefer EasySand for 2 reasons. First, as the name implies, its easier to sand than Durabond. Second, its whiter, and looks more like real plaster.
I've also patched in pieces of sheetrock for larger missing areas of plaster. Shim so the SR face is even with the plaster, and tape the edges.
I'm assuming you mean joint compound when you say spackle. Joint compound, whether the setting type, like Durabond or EasySand, or the pre-mixed green bucket, is for taping or filling joints. The blue compound is for top-coating.
Spackle is for filling small holes.
Hope this helped.
Ah, terminology is part of the confusion. By "spackle" I mean stuff for filling in minor flaws, specifically DAP Vinyl Spackling
http://www.dap.com/product_details.aspx?BrandID=135&SubcatID=23
and
Zinsser ReadyPatch
http://www.doityourself.com/invt/1408129By "joint compound" I mean plaster-like paste for embedding the tape that spans the gap between pieces of drywall.Then there is the plaster that applied over lath, but I don't know what it's called.Janet
I just discovered a hole behind an old smoke detector on the ceiling. It's about 2"×3" but is irregular in shape. The ceiling is drywall.I could cover it with mesh tape and a coat of joint compound, but that seems like a bandage rather than a genuine repair. I would rather fill in the hole with plaster to match the thickness of the surrounding drywall. Is there a way to plaster the hole, or will it be necessary to use a piece of drywall?Janet
For a hole like that, I'd cut it out so its square, (or rectangular), add some 1x blocking above the ceiling by screwing thru the rock into the wood. Then fit a piece of rock to the opening, screw it to the backing, tape and spackle it.